Power factor is important to utilities who deliver electrical power to customers. For two loads that require the same level of real power, the load with the better power factor actually demands less current from the utility. A load with a 1.0 power factor requires the minimum amount of current from the utility. Utilities may offer a reduced rate to customers with high power factor loads.
A poor power factor may be due to a phase difference between voltage and current. Power factor can also be degraded by distortion and harmonic content of the current. In some cases, distortion current waveforms tend to increase the harmonic energy content, and reduce the energy at the fundamental frequency. For a sinusoidal voltage waveform, only the energy at the fundamental frequency may transfer real power to a load. Distorted current waveforms can result from non-linear loads such as rectifier loads. Rectifier loads may include, for example, diodes such as LEDs, for example.
LEDs are becoming widely used devices capable of illumination when supplied with current. Typically, an LED is formed as a semiconductor diode having an anode and a cathode. In theory, an ideal diode will only conduct current in one direction. When sufficient forward bias voltage is applied between the anode and cathode, conventional current flows through the diode. Forward current flow through an LED may cause photons to recombine with holes to release energy in the form of light.
The emitted light from some LEDs is in the visible wavelength spectrum. By proper selection of semiconductor materials, individual LEDs can be constructed to emit certain colors (e.g., wavelength), such as red, blue, or green, for example.
In general, an LED may be created on a conventional semiconductor die. An individual LED may be integrated with other circuitry on the same die, or packaged as a discrete single component. Typically, the package that contains the LED semiconductor element will include a transparent window to permit the light to escape from the package.